Can you imagine two of the world's leading camera-makers getting together
to build a camera ?Hard to believe, we could have enjoy a universal
lens mount by now and don't have to suffer like hell.

Well, take a look at the camera in this photograph.
It's the first Canon (May not be right, see another article on Canon's logo below
- BUT it still remains as the first under the name tag, Canon), called the Hanzas
Canon. But, take a closer look at the lens, that is:

It's a Nikkor !

Why would Canon choose a lens made by its rival
for their first camera? The simple fact is, half a century ago, Canon and Nikon weren't
rivals (I hate to see these kind of rivalry has been channeled to the users as well
along the way). Back then, it took both companies to produce a quality camera.

A catalog of the time boasted of the superiority
of the lens, saying: ".......it is produced by a leading optical device manufacturer,
Nippon Kogaku K.K. (the original name of Nikon). This is the first lens (made in
Japan) ever capable of replacing high quality foreign-made lenses. "

Frankly, as far as the know-how and the technological
aspect of the lens design came from Europe. A legacy of lens- making technology left
by Heinrich Acht, an engineer who came to Nikon from Germany in the 1920s - which
enabled Kakuya Sunayama, the head of Nikon' s Design Departments to attempt to develop
a camera lens. After innumerable trials, Mr. Sunayama finally succeeded in creating
a high quality lens in 1932.

The company added an R to "Nikko":
the Japanese abbreviation for Nippon Kogaku K.K.; and named it Nikkor.

Unfortunately, Nikon had not yet perfected
a camera body. In fact, there was no Japanese camera that could compliment the NIKKOR
lens. Then one day, Canon found its way to Nikon's door. The courtship was short
and in 1934, the marriage was struck. The result you are seeing here:

The first Japanese 35mm camera, which
was made in 1935, and its Nikkor 50mm F3.5 lens. NlKKOR
lenses continued to be used in Canon cameras until 1948, when Nikon created its first
camera, the Nikon 1.

Credit: Info contributed
by Shriro Malaysia, Local distributor for Nikon.

Related interesting articles in
this site:

Canon's logo, not the famous logo that we are so accustomed to. More than half a
century ago, Canon logo was...Click here!